Stay With Me
by Ro of Ravens
Summary: It didn't matter what others thought back then. They chased the horizon and wished upon the stars, did what was wrong and somehow made it right. They didn't need anyone else, it was just them under an endless blue sky, and they liked it. –Challenge for MuffinClan–


**Stay With Me**

The leaf-bare wind blew cold and crisp. A dark sky was blanketed above, hidden by rainclouds and storms. Bare trees rattled in the chilly breeze, their branches clashing with one another as the last dull, dried leaves finally let go and drifted down to the ground, vanishing like they were never there at all.

I watched the sky, felt the first drops of rain land on my muzzle and soon start to drench my old, scarred pelt. I closed my eyes, but by now the rain and sun looked the same to me. Warmth and coldness has no difference. Joy and pain? The time and ages have numbed me, and now I felt nothing between them but the empty void of loneliness.

* * *

_A bold sunny sky was layered overhead. Drops of sunshine landed on the golden-green meadow, making it sparkle and gleam in the light. The fresh rain coated the tall blades of lush grass with glistening dew like tiny drops of pearls. Birdsong filled the air in a lively melody and the multicolored flowers danced to a soft, warm breeze._

_Two cats padded in the same direction, to what destination, they both didn't know. A young brown tomcat stalked a scurrying mouse, but eventually lost it to the thick undergrowth. A pale ginger she-cat chased and batted after a flitting blue butterfly, but it finally disappeared into the crystal sky._

_And that's when they first met._

* * *

I paced along the same path I had walked for seasons and seasons. I've seen the same pebbly shore laden with snow and frosted with ice. I've seen it layered with blazing fallen leaves from the trees up ahead. I've seen tiny, blooming flowers peek out from within the gaps and I've seen the damp rocks glistening with water in the bright sunlight. As I see them again, it just reminds me of how much time has gone by. How much time I haven't _noticed_ has gone by. How much time I've spent with your shadow lingering beside me.

Sometimes I think I can't live like this anymore, but what would you have wanted? Would you have stayed with me if you could? I shake my head solemnly to myself as I step forward. Probably not. All that's left is a bitter image of what could've been.

* * *

_The two young cats laid in the grass, windswept and breezy under a midday sun. They tilted their relaxed faces towards the illuminated sky, and they closed their eyes. Some occasional petals and blossoms and fallen leaves would drift down, and maybe one would land right on their nose, but they only giggled and brushed it off for one another. _

_They didn't mind. _

_Their pelts would brush, accidental or not, heating up at the touch, but they liked it. They liked bounding under the vast and endless sky, they liked taking slow walks through the lush sunlit forest, they liked running away and staring at the stars, imagining a future together where their paw-steps remained beside each other and their sighs harmonized. There was no one else but them right then._

_"Promise?" the dark tom whispered, gazing into the ginger she-cat's bright eyes. "Promise we'll always stay for each other?"_

_She smiled back at him, her brilliant orbs reflecting a million tiny specks of stars. "Of course. Always."_

* * *

Cold tears pricked at my eyes and one escaped, rolling down my aged, hollow cheek. I gazed across a damp, dark land.

I still remembered the days when we chased the beautiful horizon and we went far beyond the boundaries we were supposed to go. We started from the limits, we didn't listen to anyone else, and we did what we wanted to. We tried what was wrong, and we made it right. It was always just you and me. Forbidden. Yet it didn't matter.

_You promised. You promised you'd stay by my side, always._

But that promise had vanished into the air and got carried away by the breeze long ago.

* * *

**A/N: Challenge for MuffinClan. Thanks for reading and leave a review if you'd like.**


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